nightmaster

The thread title states my disgust pretty clearly, I think .

It simply makes no sense to me. DTS tracks are obviously available for many, many movies we get in region 1 but aren't present on the disc. You do a comparison to other regions and there they are, country after country getting DTS sound while region 1 does not. Yes, I realise that leaving DTS off a disc accomodates more room for extras, but DTS sound IS an extra in my book, one I'll pay for before I'll opt for a 20 minute HBO First Look documentary!

Simpson Purist

I'm a big fan of DTS, but it's not the end of the world if it's not included in something such as Star Wars or Batman Begins. Heck even the best Dolby Digital tracks can rival the best DTS tracks.

nightmaster

Agreed, Dolby Digital can rival the best DTS tracks, but in some cases do not.

It's odd to me that I can own the Alien Quadrilogy or T3 with DTS sound.....if I want to buy them outside the states!

digitalfreaknyc

There are a LOT of threads about this.

There are several reasons why other countries have DTS tracks and we don't.

1) They don't have to have as many foreign language tracks (which take up extra space).

2) It's a fake DTS track. Some countries (HK for example) can sometimes just re-encode the DD 5.1 track into DTS just because they have purchased a DTS encoder.

nightmaster

Yeah, I can see that there would be other threads on this, but I was curious for fresh input.

I can see why they would be required to carry a Spanish track, but unless it's a foreign film not others above DTS. As for fake DTS tracks, I'm talking about legitimate DVDs from regions such as Japan and Great Britain, not bootlegs from HK.

Peep

I think you'd be surpris3d by how many "fake" DTS tracks exist for Japan and Great Britain, along with other various non-region 1 countries.

digitalfreaknyc

I'm not talking about bootlegs either. They're legitimate releases.

cultshock

For some reason, markets like Hong Kong have a huge DTS fetish, and disc manufacturers make those "fake" DTS tracks just so they can slap a big DTS logo on the packaging to help sell discs. But I've heard some of these DTS tracks and they aren't anything special (and sometimes outright crap)

blindrocket

I always buy DTS over DD if I have a choice, so it matters to me.
Sometimes I find it funny that at the end of a films credits there will be the DTS logo when it was not available on the DVD.
I'd also be peeved if a newer release of the film comes out with DTS, like with Xmen 1.5.

digitalfreaknyc

The DTS logo at the end of the film just means that a theatrical DTS mix was released. It happens with a lot of movies. Doesn't mean that a DTS mix would be the same on a DVD.

cultshock

Yeah, you also see SDDS at the end of a lot of film credits, and I have yet to see a DVD with SDDS sound.

eedoon

Although DTS is a plus, it's not really a big plus for me. A well recorded Dolby Digital can almost match its DTS track, although people will generally like DTS more because it was recorded at a few dB higher.

I also have seen a lot of budget DVDs with DTS. Mostly the recordings are crap. Even the DD has better quality than the DTS track on the disc.

rdclark

It wouldn't surprise me much, if you took a DD track, re-encoded it in DTS, and raised the volume by a couple of dB, that a lot of people would believe it was superior just because it was louder.

To me the presence or absence of DTS is irrelevant to my purchase decision, and this post is about the most attention I've paid to the issue. While it's theoretically liley that a DTS track will be superior, there are too many variables in the real world to make it testable. And when such tests have been attempted (the same mix in both systems, all levels carefully matched), even experienced professional listeners have not been able to reliably choose which is DTS and which is DD.

So generally I consider DTS to be the same sound copied twice, and I'd rather have more unique content on a release if it's available.

RichC